A rat is a rat, is a rat…right?  In this case the one on your left is one that came out looking for its momma, the one on the right was also looking for its momma, but for different reasons.

It’s really funny how fate works, or better yet, Nothing happens without a reason, or I’ve heard it said, There are no accidents.  Yesterday I messaged the guy who picks up fur locally for shipping to the North American Fur Auction (NAFA).  I was curious as to how he got paid and if I was expected to give him a tip when he picks up our furs.  His answer came with a surprise;  He said he got paid via commission when the furs he sends in gets sold.  This makes perfect sense to me.  The next part of his comment was what caught me with my feet flat.  He said the latest fur pickup for the next sale was the end of this month, March.  WHAT?  The next fur pickup is not until May!  What’s going on?

I quickly went to the NAFA site and saw a special notice, dated back on February 20th that said the auction scheduled for June had been moved up to May and that the last fur pickup was in March!  Wholly smokes!  We still have about 150 raw skins to flesh and put up!  Will we have time to do this and have them adequately dried on the stretchers?

I messaged him back asking about the change in the schedule and when would be a good time for him to meet up with us to get our furs…as of right this minute I have not heard back from him.  He is a very busy guy, working a farm as well as being the fur pickup guy in Utah, Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Nevada and parts of Colorado.

So, I called Bob and Weasel to let them know we didn’t have the month of April to work in our raw furs, but rather we had a couple of days to get them up on stretchers or we will miss the due date for the next auction.  We quickly got the remaining bags of rats out of the freezer and put them out to thaw and dry.  Tomorrow will be a big day to process the furs and get them up on stretchers.

We still should have enough time available to do our own measuring and grading of our furs so we have something to compare to when we get the paper work back from NAFA after the sale in May.  This is all new to us and we are speculating just what will happen to our furs when they get to the auction house.  We can’t help but believe we have a top lot mess of rats and we should get a very good price for them.  Even after the commission that gets taken out and given to the auction house, we should net more than what a local buyer would offer us for these same rats.  Our gamble.

I haven’t told you the total rat count for the catch at the end of week 5 and the end of the season.

End of week 5 = 73 rats!  End of season total = 731 (recount is needed for week 3)

As a side note, since the season has ended:  I weighed myself the first day I set any traps and weighed 144 lbs., this morning I got on the same scales and it read 133.5 lbs!  I realized I was having to tighten my belt more than usual, but didn’t think to that extreme!

Bears Butt

March 16, 2014